Opposition is mounting among Quebec's federal Conservatives to their own party's push to award the Order of Canada to controversial hockey commentator Don Cherry. In a social media post late Thursday, the party's Quebec lieutenant Pierre Paul-Hus said he believes appointing Cherry would be "a bad idea" given his "unacceptable remarks toward the Quebec nation and francophones." The Order of...
It’s not just floor-crossing MPs warming up to Prime Minister Mark Carney. Canadians are showing high support for the Liberals and many would now back the party’s re-election, according to a new Abacus Data poll. The poll shows the Liberals have 46 per cent support nationally, an 11-point lead over the Conservatives who are at 35 per cent. The NDP...
Donald Trump's miscalculations on the impact of a war in Iran go well beyond the price of oil, and if the war doesn't end soon, we're all, Canada included going to feel it. Bruce Anderson and Chantal Hebert join for the regular Friday Good Talk where we'll also discuss: more floor crossings, more dilemmas for the NDP, and a strange...
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre says he's planning to pitch a "realistic proposal" to end U.S. tariffs on the Canadian auto industry this weekend. He says his proposed auto pact would align regulations between Canada and the U.S. and remove the GST from Canadian-made vehicles. He told reporters his plan, which he intends to roll out on Sunday, is "literally the...
The Trump administration has expanded its trade investigations to 60 countries, including Canada, in an effort to shore up the president's tariff policies. "We are trying to move very quickly," United States Trade Representative Jamieson Greer told CNBC Friday. "We are trying to move in a matter of months." Greer's office announced Wednesday that it was launching investigations of the...
NDP MP Lori Idlout became the fourth MP to cross the floor to the governing Liberals during the 45th Parliament, adding more fuel to the debate about the politically controversial practice. NDP interim leader Don Davies said his party believes floor crossers like Idlout should have to “put that decision to the voters”, and most Canadians appear to agree.
When we last reported on the Carney government’s seven national priorities, the story was largely about early alignment. Canadians broadly agreed with the direction of the agenda, but were reserving judgment on delivery. The government had set clear goals. The public was waiting to see results. Now, roughly one year into Mark Carney’s leadership, that early period of orientation is...
The American military has ordered 2,500 marines and an amphibious assault ship to the Middle East, a U.S. official said Friday, in a major addition of forces in the region after nearly two weeks of war with Iran. Meanwhile in the Iranian capital, a large explosion rocked a central square where thousands were gathered for an annual state-organized rally to...
German chancellor says all but U.S. in G7 opposed move. Three world leaders — two of them members of the G7 — stood united in opposition Friday to the Trump administration's decision to ease sanctions on Russia's shadow fleet of oil tankers. Canada's Mark Carney, Germany's Friedrich Merz and Norway's Jonas Støre were driven onto a snowy mock battlefield in...
Much is being made of Prime Minister Mark Carney’s successful efforts to poach MPs from both the Conservative and New Democratic parties in an effort to convert his minority Liberal government into a majority. But these MPs’ parliamentary perambulations are small potatoes compared to events in the early 2000s. Floor-crossings in those years helped determine the future of the conservative...
“Let the party begin.” That’s how Mark Carney started his first press conference after being sworn in as Canada’s 24th prime minister, on March 14, 2025, after a whirlwind leadership contest.
We live in a world of chatbots. The economic and social promise of large language models has driven the Western world into an AI mania that’s driving our stock markets and leading to massive investments in data centres and energy infrastructure. Yet we still don’t really know how AI works — nor the very real impacts it can have on...
The three federal by-elections that will happen in April are going to be consequential. They’ll determine whether the federal Liberal caucus will have enough members to carry votes in the House of Commons without relying on support from other parties.
A LITTLE LESS THAN a year after the April 2025 federal election, public opinion data continues to break strongly in favour of Mark Carney’s Liberal government. The latest federal poll by Leger suggests the Liberal Party now holds a substantial lead in voting intentions. The survey, conducted from February 27 to March 2 among 1,627 respondents, puts the Liberals at...
UNITED STATES PRESIDENT Donald Trump is not primarily waging war on Iran. In waging war on Iran, Trump is waging war on human reason. I do not say that war with Iran is inherently unreasonable. Nor do I mean that Trump has offered poor justifications, or justifications that most people would recognize as inadequate, in defence of his war in...
After Nunavut MP Lori Idlout announced Tuesday night that she would join the Liberals, a grim-looking Don Davies — interim leader of the NDP — had the dreary task of responding. “The position of the New Democratic Party is long-standing and clear,” he said, accurately. “To us, the decision of the voters at the ballot box is a sacred trust...
Pierre Poilievre recently declared that he would prefer not to have an election anytime soon. The Conservative leader may be in the process of getting that wish. Thanks to another floor-crossing over to the Liberals and three byelections now under way, Mark Carney may have the 172 seats he needs for a majority government, possibly plus one additional MP.
There are three federal by-elections currently underway for voting on April 13; in the ridings of University-Rosedale, Scarborough Southwest, and Terrebonne. If at least two of these go Liberal, which is almost guaranteed, Prime Minister Mark Carney will have successfully performed the political equivalent of the miracle of the loaves and fishes: he’ll have created a majority government out of...
With polling numbers showing support for the governing Liberals approaching numbers not seen since Brian Mulroney’s “grand coalition” win in 1984, it is only natural for Prime Minister Carney’s entourage to begin feeling brave about converting those numbers into a snap election sweep. Some in Liberal circles will argue that the moment has arrived to strike while the iron is...
It wasn’t that long ago that the federal NDP held the balance of political power in Canada. Now, it looks like it will be lucky to hold onto any political power at all. The defection by Nunavut MP Lori Idlout leaves them with just six federal MPs, and that’s without accounting for Alexandre Boulerice’s widely rumoured move to provincial politics...
That the riding of Terrebonne is at all competitive tells you a lot about Quebec’s shifting political landscape in the Mark Carney era. Until last year, the suburban riding on Montreal’s Rive-Nord had been a Bloc Québécois stronghold for three decades, with the exception of a one-term flirtation with the New Democratic Party in the ephemeral Orange Wave of 2011...
Last week, Prime Minister Mark Carney said his government is open to debate on a ban on social media for minors as part of their upcoming online harms legislation, something that other countries are also experimenting with, considering that the harms of these addictive platforms have become fairly self-evident when it comes to mental health outcomes. It may sound like...
By luring now-former NDP Lori Idlout across the floor to join the Liberal caucus, Prime Minister Mark Carney has brought his Liberals up to 170. With three byelections pending, two of which are in reliably safe Liberal seats and the third a Liberal-Bloc tossup, the Liberals seem set to achieve a bare minimum majority in the near future, almost a...
It has felt like a constant stream of floor crossers for months. But this was the big one. Nunavut MP Lori Idlout’s move to defect from the depleted New Democrats to the governing Liberals has put Prime Minister Mark Carney firmly in charge of the political calendar – and weakened two of his opponents with one blow. The most obvious...
In wartime, U.S. presidents usually stay in the background. Not Donald Trump on Iran. One minute he’s saying the war will soon be over; the next, he’s saying it won’t. He’s posting endlessly on Truth Social, doing press conferences, scrums, taking calls from individual reporters, giving marathon speeches. He’s the President who never shuts up. He’s turned the Oval Office...
Prime Minister Mark Carney’s imminent majority government is a good thing for the country, according to a 43 per cent plurality of Canadians in a new Angus Reid Institute poll who prefer increased stability (versus 39 per cent who said it flouts the 2025 election result.) The decision by the NDP MP for Nunavut, Lori Idlout, to cross the floor...
Liberals are on the verge of completing a historic achievement. If or when Prime Minister Mark Carney's Liberals succeed in cobbling together a majority in the House of Commons, it will surely be one of the most unique majorities in Canadian political history — cobbled together from 166 MPs elected as Liberals last spring, at least four floor-crossers and perhaps...
The Liberals are most likely to win all three byelections, which would give then a slight cushion with a two-seat majority. Mark Carney moved one step closer to a majority government overnight as another MP crossed the floor to join the Liberals. This time it was a New Democrat, not a Conservative, who decided to join as Nunavut MP Lori...
Mark Carney’s majority dreams are in the hands of the normally separatist voters of Terrebonne, a suburban community north of Montreal. Carney won 169 of 343 seats in the House of Commons on election night last April, just three short of the 171 he needs to govern with full control of the chamber. Since then, he has lured three Conservative...
It has been less than two weeks since the joint US/Israeli bombing campaign on Iran began. It is past time to bring it to a quick conclusion. Conflicting messages abound: “unconditional surrender” and “the war is very complete” from Donald Trump, and “not a single drop of oil will leave the region” from Iran. There is now clear evidence, from...
In recent days, it’s been as rare to find Prime Minister Mark Carney in Parliament as it is to spot the elusive boreal owl in the woods around Ottawa. A nine-day foreign trip, on top of a prior mission to China, plus breaks in the parliamentary schedule, and important prime ministerial business have all kept him from the House of...
The prime minister has been flying all over the world lately, doing his best to drum up new business opportunities for Canada. No criticism there. It’s a huge part of how Canada will adapt to this strange new global order, and he’s probably better suited to it than most. But let’s not miss out on chances to find new opportunities...
The Canadian economy lost more jobs in February than it has in four years — but Prime Minister Mark Carney says when compared to the United States, we're doing pretty good. "If you look at the performance of the labour market over the last six months we've created over 80,000 jobs," he said in Norway on Friday. "The United States...
Macdonald, Chrétien each saw nearly 10 opposition MPs join them during their tenures. Floor-crossing has always been a feature of Canadian politics dating back to the first Parliament — and seeing four opposition MPs jump ship to join the government in a matter of months is rare but not unprecedented. Prime Minister Mark Carney has only been in office for...
Canada and its allies are prepared to defend the arctic, Prime Minister Mark Carney said Friday in Bardufoss, Norway, after observing NATO's Cold Response exercises. He held a news conference alongside Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz. Asked by a German reporter whether the "conflict" over the Trump administration's demands for Greenland is settled, the...
A federal byelection in Terrebonne on April 13 could help the Liberals secure a majority government. The vote was ordered after the Supreme Court of Canada overturned the Liberal candidate’s one-vote victory from the last federal election due to an uncounted mail-in ballot.
The Conservatives have now named candidates for all three upcoming byelections. The party announced that middle school teacher Diana Filipova will run in Scarborough Southwest. That seat was left vacant after former Liberal cabinet minister Bill Blair resigned to take over as Canada's high commissioner in the U.K.
Ontario is set to make Premier Doug Ford and cabinet members' records secret as it "modernizes" freedom-of-information laws. Public and Business Service Delivery and Procurement Minister Stephen Crawford says the province is also updating its cybersecurity protections. Crawford says the changes will help protect cabinet confidentiality. He says the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act has not been...
Canada lost 84,000 jobs and the national unemployment rate rose to 6.7 per cent in February — 0.2 percentage points higher than the previous month, according to Statistics Canada. The Labour Force Survey for February was released Friday, and comes after January’s report showed the unemployment rate was 6.5 per cent. Those job losses were sharply lower than expected and...
A B.C. legislator who has sought to scrap the province's Human Rights Code and ban land acknowledgments, and has blamed the Tumbler Ridge mass shooting on "transgender ideology," is facing a recall campaign from constituents who say she has left them without "coherent" representation. Tara Armstrong has also been accused of spreading hate by the NDP government and is facing...
Ontario's payout to Elon Musk's SpaceX over a cancelled Starlink contract will remain a secret after the two sides agreed to a confidential settlement, The Canadian Press has learned. The province said the kill fee for what was set to be a $100-million deal is "significantly less than the contract value," and the amount paid out was part of a...
Conservative leader will also stop in Windsor for a press conference. Canada's Official Opposition leader is launching his trip to the U.S. with a stop in Detroit to talk about the automotive industry and cross-border trade, per a press release. Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre will visit the Motor City on Friday to "meet with auto industry leaders and elected representatives...
Prime Minister Mark Carney arrived in Norway today, where he will observe NATO's Cold Response exercises alongside the Norwegian prime minister. Carney is on the trip at the invitation of Norway, which hosts these joint NATO exercises every two years. This year, about 25,000 troops from 14 different nations are taking part in the exercises, which are aimed at enhancing...
Prime Minister Mark Carney touched down in Norway early Friday where he will get important face time with the Nordic country’s leader and the German chancellor before taking in a major NATO wargaming exercise that includes Canadian troops. Both countries are backing a bid by German submarine-maker TKMS to sell Canada 12 new submarines — a multi-billion dollar program that...
A new survey from Nanos Research for CTV News found 43 per cent of Canadians are less likely to travel to the United States in 2026, compared to the previous year. Thirty-eight per cent said they don’t vacation in the United States in general, while just four per cent said they are likely to spend more leisure time south of...
A former Northern MP who crossed the floor of the House of Commons decades ago is applauding Lori Idlout’s decision to do the same, saying it is easier to influence policy from the government side than the opposition. Peter Ittinuar was the first Inuk ever elected to Parliament and represented the riding of Nunatsiaq, which later became Nunavut.
As Canada approaches its second year of deciding whether to buy a full fleet of American-made F-35 fighter jets, Defence Minister David McGuinty is already thinking of joining a British-Italian-Japanese partnership working on a next-generation air force fighter. Joining the so-called Global Combat Air Programme, or GCAP, could make it much harder for Canada to ditch its plan to buy...
Prime Minister Mark Carney is expected to meet with King Charles while he's in the United Kingdom next week. Carney is set to arrive in London on Sunday after visiting Norway to observe the NATO Cold Response exercises and participate in a Nordic-Canada Council summit. The prime minister is scheduled to meet with the King on Monday, close to a...
Prime Minister Mark Carney said Thursday the government is putting an additional $32 billion into military forward operating locations in Yellowknife, Inuvik and Iqaluit and Deployed Operating Base 5 Wing in Goose Bay, Nfld. The prime minister made the announcement in Yellowknife on Thursday before taking off for a planned visit to Norway. The $32 billion is part of Canada's...
The three federal by-elections that will happen in April are going to be consequential. They’ll determine whether the federal Liberal caucus will have enough members to carry votes in the House of Commons without relying on support from other parties.
The federal government is facing questions on why an Iranian missile strike on a military hub in Kuwait, where Canadian Armes Forces (CAF) personnel are deployed, was not made public sooner. Reports of the strike were first published in La Presse on Thursday. According to the report, the incident occurred on March 1 at the Ali Al-Salem Air Base in...
Canadian border and immigration officials say they have cancelled at least 239 travel visas over concerns of their holders’ connection to Iranian leadership. That’s according to the latest numbers released by the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA), which are current as of March 5. The government first designated senior Iranian government officials, as well as security and intelligence agents, inadmissible...
The Conservatives are pushing for changes to the Criminal Code they say would offer new protections to people who use force to defend themselves during a home invasion -- but the government says Canadians already have the right to self-defence. Ontario MP Sandra Cobena introduced a private member's bill on Thursday that would change Section 34 of the Criminal Code...
A Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) base in Kuwait was hit by an Iranian missile attack, during which a fortified shelter was heavily damaged, reveals an investigation by La Presse . The incident, which occurred about ten days ago, was not disclosed to parliamentarians who held an emergency debate on the war this week. The soldiers, who were in another building...
Government House Leader Steven MacKinnon said conversations with dissatisfied MPs from opposition parties continue, just one day after his party secured its fourth floor crosser in recent months. “I think very much so,” he told reporters on his way into a cabinet meeting on Thursday, in response to a question about whether his party is talking to more MPs. “I...
The Liberal government has tabled revised “lawful access” legislation, seeking to give police new powers to access digital evidence in what federal officials say is an effort to keep pace with technological and judicial advancements. The version tabled Thursday by Public Safety Minister Gary Anandasangaree is a second attempt at advancing legislation of this kind in this Parliament, after the...
The Carney government is promising more than $37 million in humanitarian aid for civilians in Lebanon caught in the crossfire between Israel and Hezbollah. Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand announced the aid today alongside Randeep Sarai, secretary of state for international development.
The Trump administration launched trade investigations of multiple countries Wednesday in an attempt to solidify the president's tariff policies after the Supreme Court struck down his previous efforts to realign global trade. Canada was not included in the list of countries targeted by President Donald Trump's investigations under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974. Mexico is on the...
The mandated review of the Access to Information Act, includes proposals from the government that are 'super regressive,' says veteran journalist Dean Beeby. 'It’s just bureaucrats running the show, and we’re all going to lose, because they’re not eager at all to open the system up and be transparent.'
With the latest floor crossing, Mark Carney has established himself as the prime minister who’s convinced the most opposition MPs to join the governing party since Jean Chretien nearly three decades ago. First it was Conservative MP Chris d’Entremont in November. Then, Conservative MP Michael Ma in December, both citing the need for unity and a desire to work with...
Shock, frustration and dejection swept over New Democrats on Wednesday after MP Lori Idlout abandoned the party to join Mark Carney’s Liberals, putting them on the cusp of forming a majority government. The Nunavut MP’s defection, which came just weeks ahead of the selection of a new NDP leader, left party members stunned and in deep reflection about the New...
Alberta's chambers of commerce say talk of the province potentially quitting Confederation is bad for business, with one saying it's time Premier Danielle Smith's government move on from blaming former prime minister Justin Trudeau. The Alberta Chambers of Commerce says a recent survey of members and investors suggested more than half of participants say the provincial separation issue is affecting...
The World Anti-Doping Agency is considering rewriting its rules to try barring President Donald Trump and all U.S. government officials from attending the LA Olympics in 2028 in a move that could also have implications for the World Cup being hosted by the U.S. this summer.
NEW YORK (AP) -- As the U.S. and Israel's war against Iran continues to upend energy markets and supply chains worldwide, the Trump administration says it might suspend maritime shipping requirements under a more than century-old law known as the Jones Act.
1. A federal judge on Friday quashed Justice Department subpoenas issued to the Federal Reserve in January, a severe blow to an investigation that has already attracted strong criticism on Capitol Hill.
The Trump administration denounced CNN on Thursday for airing a portion of the new Iranian supreme leader's public statement, the second time in three days that he's targeted the network for reporting on how the regime is responding to the American attacks.
DND says country placed 'caveat' on U.S. intelligence-sharing for small-boat strikes. The Department of National Defence says it has safeguards in place to prevent intelligence from being shared with elements of the U.S. military that have carried out numerous lethal strikes on small boats in the Caribbean. In a statement to CBC News, the department said that intelligence gathered during...
Oil prices continued to soar on Monday as the Iran war intensified, threatening production and shipping in the Middle East and pummeling financial markets. The price for a barrel of Brent crude, the international standard, surged to as high $119.50 per barrel early in the day but later was trading above $101 per barrel, up 9%. West Texas Intermediate, the...
The Canadian government will face questions about its “confusing” stance on the Iran war when the House of Commons hosts a debate on the conflict tonight, according to former foreign affairs minister Lloyd Axworthy. “It’s still not clear about where Canada stands on the fundamental issue of the rule of law, which says aggression is an international crime,” Axworthy told...
Saudi Arabia sharpened its warnings to Iran early Monday, telling Tehran it would be the "biggest loser" if it continues to attack Arab states. The Saudi statement came after a new drone attack apparently targeted its massive Shaybah oil field. The kingdom dismissed comments by Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian on Saturday that Iran had halted its attacks on Gulf Arab...
The United States and Israel do not have a "blank cheque" in their bombing campaign in Iran, and are still bound by international law, Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand said on Friday, as the war in the Middle East approaches the seven-day mark.
Canada is confronting a rapidly expanding illicit nicotine market that has evolved well beyond traditional contraband tobacco. Criminal networks that once focused on cigarettes now traffic in high-nicotine disposable vapes, unauthorized nicotine pouches, and a sprawling ecosystem of online black market platforms. Fragmented regulation, uneven enforcement, and the rise of e-commerce have created structural vulnerabilities that illicit actors are exploiting...
War in energy-producing regions often reveals the hidden architecture of globalization. The ongoing US-Iran conflict is doing precisely that. Disruption around the Strait of Hormuz has begun transforming energy trade into “risk trade,” where freight insurance, shipping routes, and geopolitical exposure can become as decisive as underlying supply. For China and other Asia-Pacific importers, this shift has two strategic implications...
A collection of SubStack publishing within Canadian public affairs.
For a moment there, it looked like Mark Carney would be the torchbearer for countries opposed to Trump’s big power politics. Now, not so much. In fact, it seems Prime Minister Carney is ready to embrace the “end of the international rules-based order” rather than oppose it – thanks to the confusing and contradictory statements by the Canadian government following...
On Thursday, the Liberal government finally got around to asking ordinary Canadians how to fix the country’s premier transparency law, the Access to Information Act. The Act, dating from 1983, empowers citizens to hold governments to account through requests for internal information.
Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei was a monster. For close to thirty years, he presided over a police state that violated human rights at home and exported terror to the world. Now he is dead, crushed by the American assault on Iran that flattened his compound and sparked a regional war. From Tehran to Toronto, thousands of Iranians are celebrating...
Donald Trump's miscalculations on the impact of a war in Iran go well beyond the price of oil, and if the war doesn't end soon, we're all, Canada included going to feel it. Bruce Anderson and Chantal Hebert join for the regular Friday Good Talk where we'll also discuss: more floor crossings, more dilemmas for the NDP, and a strange...
At Issue this week: A fourth member of parliament ditches their party to join Mark Carney’s Liberals. The Conservatives push the government to step up deportations of Iranian Revolutionary Guard members. And Pierre Poilievre takes his speaking tour to the U.S.
Thomas Juneau joins Janice Stein to discuss the war in the Middle East, if doing nothing is an option for Canada, the diaspora politics involved, what role middle powers can play, and how Canada has been “lazy” about its national security. They also discuss the incredible pace of this war, why you cannot “bomb your way to regime change,” the...
Mark Carney’s Liberals have a majority in sight after adding Nunavut MP Lori Idlout to their ranks. The former New Democrats has pushed the Liberals to 170 seats in the House of Commons, meaning they are only two short of a majority with three vacancies set to be filled in a trio of byelections on April 13. This week on...
